Bring On the POLL - ILM Artist Poll #116 - THE POLICE - (Results Thread)

Paul Bowles. Sting is smart!

also, listening to a lot of Police in recent weeks I’m struck by how much casual misogyny I hear in the lyrics.

xpost The Police struggled to release as many albums as they did!

the dominance of the vocal and the narrative over such a sparse backing track make me feel this is the most solo sting song in the police catalogue

the dominance of the vocal and the narrative over such a sparse backing track make me feel this is the most solo sting song in the police catalogue

also, listening to a lot of Police in recent weeks I’m struck by how much casual misogyny I hear in the lyrics.

tbf Sting kind of leaned into creepy-guy narratives. Big hits include guy in love with sex worker, guy in love with underage girl, guy who can't even get up the nerve to call her, guy stalking his ex and saying "Can't you see/You belong to me." I'm not sure any of them are supposed to be exactly sympathetic, except maybe the sad sack in "Every Little Thing."

That guy has a big umbrella, though.

he's also weirdly keen on telling us just how wet he's getting

https://i.imgur.com/koeaWkP.jpg

31. I Burn for You
From: Brimstone & Treacle (soundtrack)
Released: October 1982
183 Points, 5 Votes, 1 Number One

The Police's "I Burn for You" is a song Sting originally wrote for the band Last Exit in the mid-1970s; he later offered it to The Police for Zenyatta Mondatta in 1980, but it was deemed "too sentimental" for their musical direction. The band eventually chose to record it for their fourth album Ghost In The Machine the following year, but it did not make the cut.

Never heard this one! It's now only available on the Ghost In The Machine (Alternate Sequence) released this year, which I never got around to.

Crazy it didn’t make either album, it’s one of their best songs

Btw if you wanna hear Bombs Away with Stew singing, check out the Gizmodrome version. A number of lyrical changes too.

jesus I hoped we would be able to avoid discussing that ghastly film.

Also - the misogyny isn't the creepy-guy stuff, e.g. in Synchro II, "secretaries pout and preen / like cheap tarts in a red light street" and "mother chants a litany of boredom and frustration / but we know all her suicides are fake".

fantastic song! first part has such a heavy atmosphere, makes me feel slightly delirious when the second bit kicks in

Got a number one vote too:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQtIRrmhvBw

I love "I Burn for You." I also have a weird affection for the film, I saw it as a young teen (mostly because I was a big Police fan) and thought it was fascinatingly fucked-up.

Going to do 13 today, 13 tomorrow and then 14 on Friday.

I'm done with work for the day so I should be a bit faster on these last few.

Never heard this one! It's now only available on the Ghost In The Machine (Alternate Sequence) released this year, which I never got around to.

be warned, the version on that album is only 3 minutes long - they've chopped off the final two minutes(!)

thanks Bee you're doing great so far btw!

As a mad Police fan in my teens I had no idea there was an official soundtrack for B&T, and so I taped IBFY off the VHS we had rented, which is why the copy I listened to had the incoherent cries of the couple's daughter mixed in with the track.

Thanks, it just sucks that I can't be more active in this poll, but it's for the people and I'm fine with that. Still has been fun putting it all together and counting down these songs.

xpost

We're enjoying it! Thanks, Bee.

I had the B&T soundtrack album, listened to it a fair amount. (I also voted for "Only You" off it in the solo poll.)

side poll: what is sting's greatest movie role?

https://i.ibb.co/DK0VDMD/helith.jpg

Quadrophenia

Ace Face no less

A friend of mine saw Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels in the theatre. Apparently Sting makes what is meant to be a big entrance, but the only reaction in the theatre was my friend groaning in exasperation.

what a list:

As actor

Quadrophenia (1979) – The Ace Face, the King of the Mods, a.k.a. the Bell Boy in the film adaptation of the Who album.
Radio On (1979) – Just Like Eddie
The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle (1980) – Leader of the Blow Waves. The footage was cut but it later reappeared in the DVD version and in the documentary The Filth and the Fury (2000).
Artemis 81 (1981) – The angel Helith (BBC TV film)
Brimstone and Treacle (1982) – Martin Taylor, a drifter
Dune (1984) – Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen
Titus Groan (1984) – Steerpike (BBC Radio 4 broadcast based on the Mervyn Peake novel)
Gormenghast (1984) – Steerpike (BBC Radio 4 broadcast based on the Mervyn Peake novel)
Plenty (1985) – Mick, a black-marketeer
The Bride (1985) – Baron Frankenstein
Walking to New Orleans (1985) – Busker, singing Moon Over Bourbon Street.
The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988) – a "heroic officer"
Stormy Monday (1988) – Finney, a nightclub owner
Julia and Julia (1988) – Daniel, a British gentleman
The Grotesque (1995), a/k/a Gentlemen Don't Eat Poets and Grave Indiscretion – Fledge
Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998) – J.D., Eddie's father and owner of a bar.
Kaamelott: The First Chapter (2021) – Horsa

As himself

Urgh! A Music War (1982)
Bring On the Night (1985)
Saturday Night Live (1991) – host, various
The Simpsons episode "Radio Bart" (1992)
The Smell of Reeves and Mortimer Episode 5 (1995)
The Larry Sanders Show episode "Where Is the Love?" (1996)
Ally McBeal season four episode "Cloudy Skies, Chance of Parade" (2001)
Everyone Stares: The Police Inside Out (2006)
Studio 60 on Sunset Strip (2006)
Vicar of Dibley Comic Relief special (2007)
Bee Movie (2007)
Little Britain USA (2008) as Stomp, the lead singer of "the Cops" (playing "Fields of Gold")
Brüno (2009)
Still Bill (2009)
Do It Again (2010)
Life's Too Short (2011)
2012: Time for Change (2011)
The Michael J. Fox Show (2013) (singing "August Wind" from The Last Ship)
20 Feet from Stardom (2013)
Zoolander 2 (2016)
Have a Good Trip: Adventures in Psychedelics (2020)
Only Murders in the Building (2021)

He's never sexier than in a supporting role in Stormy Monday

A friend of mine saw Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels in the theatre. Apparently Sting makes what is meant to be a big entrance, but the only reaction in the theatre was my friend groaning in exasperation.

hearty lols @ this!

OMG now I need the DVD of Great R&R Swindle (not just for that but for any other extras)

I forgot abt his Only Murders cameo too, very good

interesting how the Urgh movie is framed entirely around them given some of the wild outliers that are in that film

like, the makers of the movie clearly thought they were the most popular act that would the flick

that would *sell* the flick

when in reality, in my experience, people went to see the Cramps/DKs/Gang Of Four/Numan/etc

had no idea until recently that the cramps actually were the support act for the police on one of their first national tours of the uk

What was that movie that was about CBGB scene and they end the movie with the Police being the next big thing? Never made sense to me as they were not New York

https://i.imgur.com/ibTyIX0.jpg

30. The Bed’s Too Big Without You
From: Zenyattà Mondatta
Single Released: 1979
192 Points, 16 Votes

"The Bed's Too Big Without You" was first released on Reggatta de Blanc in 1979. However, the following year, the song saw a single release as a bonus single in the Six Pack box set, which featured the band's five previous British singles (excluding "Fall Out"). Said box set peaked at No. 17 in Britain. The song was also released as the B-side to "So Lonely" in Germany.

A promo video for "The Bed's Too Big Without You" was performed by the band on The Kenny Everett Video Show. It featured the band members miming to the song in a suburban house.

it's peculiar that I find myself doing this, but some of you guys are suggesting that this band's work was not politically oriented: there is no question that Sting believed that his music had a political purpose, which is to say left-wing, human rights-advocacy. This was very very clear to me and other kids in grade school and hundreds of thousands of the band's fans. perhaps you guys think the Police's M.O. was more mushy and safe, more like U2 than the Clash, and fair enough, but in no way do I nor should anyone else doubt that Sting had sincere convictions as such. He was angered when Stewart's dad, a founder of the CIA, suggested that the Police's fans were impressionable and that they could be manipulated for purposes advantageous to U.S. interests abroad in the 1980s; since he stayed with Miles Copeland, who is very conservative, through the rest of his career, one could say he compartmentalized (and Stew has never said much about his own convictions, despite his family), and he clearly is not renouncing his wealth, but Sting believes that his work is if possessed of left wing bona fides

otm

Oh for sure, as a young Police fan I totally thought of them and Sting in particular as being political. Sting played at those Secret Policemen's Ball shows, did Amnesty International work, he was definitely high up on the '80s do-gooder rocker lists.

Love "Bed's Too Big" and voted for it, such a slinky groove.

"Bed's" an amazing production, with some of Sting's best bass playing.

I believe that *Sting* is political and the band did political stuff. I was talking specifically about the songs, which are by and large *not* political, especially compared to a band like the Clash. No judgement, just saying.

I like this from the Secret Policeman's Other Ball film.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mo1GRM4FhcI

for a self-avowed not-a-reggae-band, this is an incredible reggae tune

sting’s bass pushed “bed” into my top 5, it’s a groove i could listen to for hours

Do we need a Spotify for this, anyone want to start one?

"The Bed’s Too Big Without You" got 16 votes, 16! It was like a lot of people picked this song as their 19th or 20th selection (guessing as I didn't actually research this).The vote total won't get up this high until song number 17.

https://i.imgur.com/grteOC2.jpg

29. Man in a Suitcase
From: Zenyattà Mondatta
Released: October 3. 1980
200 Points, 7 Votes

This feels like a single, I'm actually shocked it wasn't one.

https://i.imgur.com/zU3SPtu.jpg

28. Demolition Man
From: Ghost in the Machine
Released: October 2, 1981
209 Points, 6 Votes